I've been working on my MFA, and my most recent project required two things: 1. a collaboration and 2. a public outcome. Oh, and do it all in 10 weeks.

I ended up reaching out to Tali Caspi, who is an urban ecologist who studies the coyotes that live in San Francisco. So, being completely self-interested, I hoped she would work with me to put something together so that I could learn more about the animals and get to nosey a bit more into her research.

A couple weeks ago, we put on my public event. It was a gallery that consisted of 10 paintings of the coyotes, based on photographs she'd taken of the animals during her field research, and they also incorporated data from her most recent paper, plus she gave a really fantastic educational and myth-busting talk. It was pretty cool, honestly, and I'm incredibly thankful that she was up for the collab.

We might try and show the paintings again and have another educational day this summer, once she's done turning in her PhD. so TBD on that. I'll upload the full gallery soon, and I think I'll sell them for a local wildlife rehab hospital, if anyone wants to give buy one.

We also made some booklets for the show that San Francisco Animal Care will also be distributing soon, and you can email me and ask for one, too. More details about the show and such are over here.

I've tried a variety of times to keep month notes, week notes, logs, all sorts. Failure, all of them.

However.

I still need to solve these anxieties for myself:

• Feeling like time slips by too fast.
• Feeling like I'm not getting anything done.

The system that's finally worked for me is one that's private and low-effort, scrappy and ugly.

At the beginning of the year, I started a fresh daily log book. The rules are:

• No rules!
• Actually, rules: just notes, don't plan, don't think.
• No pressure to write something funny, clever or interesting, because only I'll read it^🟉.
• Write anything for every day, no matter how mundane. I existed, therefore something happened.
• Skipping a day isn't the end of the universe, but go back and fill it in anyway.

The perfect book for this turned out to be the calendar version of my already-favourite notebook form factor that I've been using for years. The Leuchtturm1917 week planner and notebook in B6+.

On the left-hand side are the days of the week. At the end of the day, I write a few words to describe what happened that day (e.g. finished annoying project. went to movies. did laundry.). The right-hand side is just a piece of lined paper, so that's a place I can either leave totally blank or use freeform. I've used the right-hand side to hold badly-thought-out ideas, unbaked to-dos, lists of things bothering me, sketches, contact info, or as a scrapbook of random bits of paper I've collected that week. The cover gets any stickers I am given.

I have filled it in for every day this year, so far, and flicking back through it is satisfying. It is effective in addressing the aforementioned anxieties in an amount that is worth continuing next year.

That's it. That's the post.

^🟉 Do you ever stop and wonder what will happen to all your stuff when you die? Like, will the person clearing out my shelves for recycling bother to stop and read my notebooks? Probably not.

From right now, until September 19th 2024, BFF.fm has an auction going, including one of my paintings that I donated to the station. BFF is a non-profit community radio station in San Francisco, and I'm so happy to have the opportunity to suppor them this way.

The auction also includes some other pieces of art from more local artists, as well as a bunch of other fun things from all kinds of other local businesses - I've got my eye on the Craftsman and Wolves set.

BFF is also hosting their annual gala on the 19th, so if you're a local and it sounds like something up your street, check out tickets for that, too.

I’ll have some paintings up at the inaugural community show at The Faight Collective from this month, through to September.

They’re having an opening party (that I can’t make) on the 13th July, 6pm - 10pm and then all the art will be hanging in their space until mid-September. You can buy a ticket for the party over on their eventbrite.

On 11th February, from 11am to 6pm, I'll be doing a pop-up with Bernal Village Marketplace. I'll have a selection of prints, framed pieces and originals availble! Come see me!